Arma 2 on windows 7

[Guest]

Hey Fellas,

I recently decided to try out the new windows 7 in 64 bit. I had previously tried the beta version which was actually pretty good, but it seems since then they have added a ton of useless crap!

After installing Arma 2, at first I didn't notice much difference in performance. The fps was a little lower for sure, but I thought that would be in exchange for smoother gameplay.

How wrong I was! After carefully evaluating the performance and running several scenarios, it is apparent that on Windows 7 Ultimate 64 bit, your system will be needlessly wasted.

The game was constantly stuttering, always having to load when I looked around etc. I recrated a large AI battle scene again, and rather than getting a nice 18-22fps as before, I was left with a shoddy 2-8fps.

I examined the processes on my pc, and after comparing with my newly reinstalled XP, I am amazed at all the crap going on in Windows 7! In XP my average commit charge never generally goes above 100m, and my cpu usage is 0%. In XP after a fresh install, I just about have 20 processes running. On windows 7...

The commit charge is always above 800m! To add to that, the CPU usage lingers at 3%. The process count is over double, with over 50 active processes! This may not seem bad, but my god the performance decrease is horrible.

Just thought I would share that little info, maybe it can help out some people who are still unsure of how fast windows 7 is with Arma 2. I will be sticking to XP for a long time!

Edited January 30, 2010 by Guest

[Zipper5 74]

I keep getting told by people how awesome Windows 7 is, and how great it is compared to XP. Granted, it is an obvious improvement over Vista, but that's not exactly hard. I figured they think it's awesome because of all the gimmick features and the new themes that Microsoft has thrown in, and that it will be as much of an unnecessary performance hog as Vista was. I decided not to buy it and, apparently, that was the right thing to do. XP FTW.

[Guest]

Word mate, word! I must admit, as a non gaming platform I really do like Windows 7. But from a performance side, I think it needs much more time.

I would like to experience DX11 aswell, but I can wait. Trusty old DX9 never let me down!

[Grizzle 0]

This hasn't been my experience with Win 7 64 and A2. In terms of performance it is only *slightly* worse than my old XP setup.

You are right about one thing though - there's a lot of useless crap running - which is why I have this site permanently bookmarked in my head. I went with the "tweaked" version.

[Guest]

Yeah thanks Grizzle, I went through that site before, unfortunately i don't have the patience to go through all that lol!

I think the main issue for me was how clean my XP was, I was always making sure everything was as perfect as I could make it. When I got windows 7, there was instantly more going on on a fresh install, then what I had going on with a 1 year old install of XP.

[mali robot 10]

There is a test of gaming performance of win 7 vs. vista. vs xp here (check other pages of the test too):

http://www.firingsquad.com/hardware/windows_7_gaming/page3.asp

It seems that Arma 2 is the only game which runs worse on win 7 than on XP. Between those two OS, in other games performance is usually equal.

[joey_45 0]

Why go for the Ultimate version... that has tonnes of useless crap that you don't need or ever use...

[Zeron 10]

Since you didnt post your computer specs, this is nothing more then a flame thread about how outdated your computer is and how unable to run the most resource hungry game ever made on an operation system made in 2009

[mosh 0]

I've been using Windows 7 since the beta was first released and have been very happy with it. I used XP 64-bit before. I skipped Vista. I never tried Arma 2 with XP though, so no comment on that.

I would imagine a stripped down version (non-ultimate and/or using Viper tweaks) might be a little better... but it works for me as is.

Since you didnt post your computer specs, this is nothing more then a flame thread about how outdated your computer is and how unable to run the most resource hungry game ever made on an operation system made in 2009

Thanks for sharing this with us Zero... :j:

[Zipper5 74]

Since you didnt post your computer specs, this is nothing more then a flame thread about how outdated your computer is and how unable to run the most resource hungry game ever made on an operation system made in 2009

Thanks for flamebaiting. ;)

Richie has a pretty damn good PC. Take a look at some of his ArmA II videos. He's running on pretty high settings and getting a ridiculously good framerate. That's good evidence that he does not have a crappy PC.

[Zeron 10]

Thanks for flamebaiting. ;)

Richie has a pretty damn good PC. Take a look at some of his ArmA II videos. He's running on pretty high settings and getting a ridiculously good framerate. That's good evidence that he does not have a crappy PC.

As i said without the specs this post has no use ;)

[Zipper5 74]

That was a hint to actually check out his channel, linked in his signature. If you had, you would have seen the following:

System Specs:

Windows xp 32 bit/Windows 7 64 bit (Dual boot)

ATI Radeon 4870 512mb

4GB DDR2 RAM (2x 2GB sticks)

Intel Dual Core E8500 @ 3.7ghz

And a crap sound card :P

So yes, he does have a pretty good PC.

[Zeron 10]

sorry man i am not visiting channels like that, linked or not :)

Well its a not so bad PC indeed. A bit outdated CPU and a bit too few VRAM still i dont understand why it wouldnt run Arma2 in an acceptable level. I mean down to 8FPS from 22 is extreme. I will gladly admit Win7 may be slower in certain games but this level of FPS decrease points towards bad drivers instead of a shit operation system, which every benchmark proves to be not so shitty :)

[Guest]

Since you didnt post your computer specs, this is nothing more then a flame thread about how outdated your computer is and how unable to run the most resource hungry game ever made on an operation system made in 2009

My specs are more than capable of running Arma 2 at a very high standard actually. I am not flaming Windows 7, it is a great system. I am simply saying that for Arma 2 it doesn't feel that great compared with XP.

As i said without the specs this post has no use ;)

No use? Why did you comment?

sorry man i am not visiting channels like that, linked or not :)

Well its a not so bad PC indeed. A bit outdated CPU and a bit too few VRAM still i dont understand why it wouldnt run Arma2 in an acceptable level. I mean down to 8FPS from 22 is extreme. I will gladly admit Win7 may be slower in certain games but this level of FPS decrease points towards bad drivers instead of a shit operation system, which every benchmark proves to be not so shitty :)

Channels like what?

Hmmm, outdated? I wouldn't say that to be honest, maybe compared with Quad Cores, but it is still the fastest Dual core on the market. I will openly admit Arma 2 runs much faster on Quad Core however.

Down to 8fps from 22, if you have seen any of my llarge scale videos, you will see how much I have had to tune and overclock my system. I do not have bad drivers, and I do not have a bad set up. I spent many hours, days and weeks to make my system run Arma 2 as good as it possibly could, and the results are clearly visible in my videos.

If you are too lazy to click a link, it is not my problem. Sometimes not everything is dished out on a plate...:dance:

Anyway, I do not want to divert this thread. I just posted my opinion on the sytems performance under load. Of course, I would love to try Windows 7 with some of the tweaks mentioned, and I am sure ultimate is not the fastest version.

Regards,

Richie.

[5133p39 16]

I am using Win 7 64 Home premium (really, who needs Ultimates? especially for playing games) and i am very satisfied.

I switched off some unnecessary services, but no more than what i had to do in my old WinXP to make them behave.

It boots fast, it is quick when you have it running, and the display drivers are finally out of the kernel (don't know if that was already in Vista).

I have some complaints about Win7, but not about their performance.

ArmA2 performs the same on my Win7 as it did on my WinXP Pro - at least it seems so.

But if i get 2 FPS less on Win7 i cannot say, maybe yes, but i would be surprised if the difference would be bigger than that.

And i run on pretty average hardware (maybe except the GC):

Intel Core i5-750, MSI P55-something motherboard, 4GB RAM (something cheap), ATI 5970, onboard audio.

If it runs much worse on somebody's else Win7, then i think the problem is driver related, or garbage related, but surely no purely OS related.

Maybe your GC drivers are buggy or maybe they aren't yet available in proper working state, but surely it is not fault of Win7, more likely your HW vendor is to blame (for bad drivers), or you (no offence, for messed up OS/drivers installation).

My point is:

You can say "Windows XP are better for playing ArmA2 if you got the Nvidia GQX999 graphics card, because there are no drivers for it under Win7",

but you shouldn't say "Windows XP are better for gaming than Windows 7".

It depends on the combination of all the things like your HW+OS+drivers and the games you are playing.

Questions:

Are you sure, you set ArmA2 settings the same as on XP? including any catalyst settings?

What version of GC drivers are you using on XP and on Win7?

About that commit charge, how is/are your pagefile(s) settings?

Edited January 30, 2010 by 5133p39

[Guest]

I am using Win 7 64 Home premium (really, who needs Ultimates? especially for playing games) and i am very satisfied.

I switched off some unnecessary services, but no more than what i had to do in my old WinXP to make them behave.

It boots fast, it is quick when you have it running, and the display drivers are finally out of the kernel (don't know if that was already in Vista).

I have some complaints about Win7, but not about their performance.

ArmA2 performs the same on my Win7 as it did on my WinXP Pro - at least it seems so.

But if i get 2 FPS less on Win7 i cannot say, maybe yes, but i would be surprised if the difference would be bigger than that.

And i run on pretty average hardware (maybe except the GC):

Intel Core i5-750, MSI P55-something motherboard, 4GB RAM (something cheap), ATI 5970, onboard audio.

If it runs much worse on somebody's else Win7, then i think the problem is driver related, or garbage related, but surely no purely OS related.

Maybe your GC drivers are buggy or maybe they aren't yet available in proper working state, but surely it is not fault of Win7, more likely your HW vendor is to blame (for bad drivers), or you (no offence, for messed up OS/drivers installation).

My point is:

You can say "Windows XP are better for playing ArmA2 if you got the Nvidia GQX999 graphics card, because there are no drivers for it under Win7",

but you shouldn't say "Windows XP are better for gaming than Windows 7".

It depends on the combination of all the things like your HW+OS+drivers and the games you are playing.

Questions:

Are you sure, you set ArmA2 settings the same as on XP? including any catalyst settings?

What version of GC drivers are you using on XP and on Win7?

About that commit charge, how is/are your pagefile(s) settings?

I can see where you are coming from, and I totally agree. All in all I think my hardware is primarilly designed for XP, seeing as Windows 7 did not exist when they were manufactured.

I think if i upgraded to much newer hardware I would get much better performance, but definitely not as good as XP. I think many other people experience at least small issues with Windows 7, but like all computer related issues, everybody gets different results :)

[Leopoldo 10]

I would love to use Windows 7 to run ARMA 2 but simple fact is that it wont run correctly. Everything else does but i constantly get "Crash to Desktop" or rather just "Desktop" since there is no error associated with it, for whatever reason the game will just boot me to the desktop, ARMA 2 is still running under Task Manager but i am unable to get back into the game since its icon is no longer on the taskbar or in the ALT+TAB menu.

This usually happens when i try and save but can happen when getting out of vehicles or just randomly.

I have no idea whats causing it but if i look in the ARMA 2 log files there are a tonne of errors logged.

Every other game works flawlessly under Windows 7 Professional 64bit, i have a modern system which is 100% stable both under OC and stock (i have tried both but it still happens).

I could try lowering the quality settings to see if that helps but considering these settings work under XP and i only have access to SLI (2 GPU's) i dont see why i should have to lower settings under Windows 7 when i should have access to Quad SLI.

Others are experiencing this issue under Windows 7 so i am hoping it gets fixed in a patch, until then i guess i am forced to play ARMA 2 under XP whilst every other game i can use Windows 7.

[Nicholas 5]

Agreed, windows XP had much better performance compared to Windows 7. Windows 7 is still good, but too much eye candy.

Edited January 31, 2010 by Nicholas

[Opticalsnare 12]

Windows 7 is better than vista, vista was fucking shite.

[Zeron 10]

My specs are more than capable of running Arma 2 at a very high standard actually. I am not flaming Windows 7, it is a great system. I am simply saying that for Arma 2 it doesn't feel that great compared with XP.

Yes you have more then capable system.

No use? Why did you comment?

Because its good feedback if you add the specs to the post, so i pointed out and it happened ;)

Hmmm, outdated? I wouldn't say that to be honest, maybe compared with Quad Cores, but it is still the fastest Dual core on the market. I will openly admit Arma 2 runs much faster on Quad Core however.

Yes as i mentioned your rig should have no problem running this game, doesnt matter the OS.

Down to 8fps from 22, if you have seen any of my llarge scale videos, you will see how much I have had to tune and overclock my system. I do not have bad drivers, and I do not have a bad set up. I spent many hours, days and weeks to make my system run Arma 2 as good as it possibly could, and the results are clearly visible in my videos.

I am not saying you dont, but still if there is no good drivers for your motherboard etc, then doesnt matter how much you finetune.

[Black0ps 0]

wow thanks for posting was about to buy windows 7.. is Vista the same?

[Guest]

Yes you have more then capable system.

Because its good feedback if you add the specs to the post, so i pointed out and it happened ;)

Yes as i mentioned your rig should have no problem running this game, doesnt matter the OS.

I am not saying you dont, but still if there is no good drivers for your motherboard etc, then doesnt matter how much you finetune.

Ok fair enough, I understand you now :)

Sorry for getting so wound up lol:p

[kklownboy 43]

I am using Win 7 64 Home premium (really, who needs Ultimates? especially for playing games) and i am very satisfied.

For the RAM limitation.Pro is better too.

---------- Post added at 01:01 AM ---------- Previous post was at 12:57 AM ----------

I can see where you are coming from, and I totally agree. All in all I think my hardware is primarilly designed for XP, seeing as Windows 7 did not exist when they were manufactured.

...

Only if they (your hardware) dont have drivers, and Vista Hardware is fine for win7 and even Vista Drivers are ok for Win7. Maybe 64 versus 32 is the issue...

[eble 3]

I had arma2 running sweet and very fast on a win xp 32 system, I thought, well why not get the win 7 64 and make use of this extra ram.

Performance cannot match what I had under win xp thats for sure, it's not bsd but it not as good.

[kklownboy 43]

wow thanks for posting was about to buy windows 7.. is Vista the same?

Win7 and Vista are SOOO much better than XP32... Get past the new/lack of Classic style, and the odd placements of old habits...Cant even remember the lasttime i booted up Xp32 to do anything, other than help out a client... Never will again game on XP.. win7 has VM for XP built in... Anyhoo if you use 4GPUs or want more than 16GB of RAM, or 2 CPU sockets, Win7 Pro or ultimate. ARMA2 runs fine, better than XP32 on Win7.